Dangerous Jam

Thirteen duels and an orgy.

If I get through all this tonight, I will go eat dinner and watch some Flashpoint. Really dense material below - but interesting.

Summary:

- PTSD is largely a matter of conditioned physiological changes, which are very hard to change via insight and introspection alone.

- Many people face trauma, but not all develop PTSD. People are wired to respond to fear with action (fight/flight.) If they are immobilized and helpless, literally or metaphorically, during a trauma, they are likely to develop PTSD. This may have a biological basis. If they could take action - complete the fight/flight response - they may be able to decondition some of their PTSD reflexes.

- Traumatized people often freak out when meditating due to its internal focus's tendency to send them straight into traumatic memories. But meditation or mindfulness would probably be helpful if they could manage it. Wonder if movement-based meditative practices are less likely to cause freak-outs? If so, that would explain why so many survivors find movement practices helpful. Maybe the movement provides a balance between interior feelings (scary/bad) and external focus (move left arm to block), thus decreasing interior focus and making it more tolerable.

If the trauma is partly caused by the interruption of the fight/flight response and people being forced, physically or by circumstance, into helplessness or inaction, then maybe movement lets them work through the fight/flight (action) response they needed, thus rewiring conditioned responses.